Parking assist controls for guiding a vehicle into a parking space or the like are in practical use. According to such parking assist control, the vehicle is run at a vehicle speed set by the driver in order to guide the vehicle into a location where the driver wants to park. Giving consideration to the vehicle's inertia and a response delay in hardware mechanisms that generate a braking force for stopping the vehicle, the vehicle must be run at an extremely low speed at this time.
To achieve this, Japanese Patent Application Publication No. JP-A-2005-57962 discloses a motor control device capable of running a vehicle at an extremely low speed. The motor control device controls a motor provided in an electric vehicle or the like, and runs the vehicle at an extremely low speed so as to enable movement of only a set minute distance.
However, the art disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. JP-A-2005-57962, where a motor is used to run a vehicle at an extremely low speed, can only be applied to vehicles equipped with a motor. Such art cannot be applied to vehicles running on engine power alone, which are the most popularized type of vehicle in use.